I felt like having traveled and lived for an unbelievable long time, and when I saw one of our moons hitting the planet, looking at the devastation that followed, it was too much for my mind, and I lost consciousness.
Later on I woke up in a bed in the infirmary of our base. Yuri and I were in a sorry state. The icy cold of the continent seemed to have penetrated to our bones. Shooting pains in the joints prevented the slightest movement. It took months of grueling rehabilitation sessions to even stand up and walk. Then I learned that our men dragged Yuri and me out of the stone fence. I believe that there was still some kind of an active force field within it, a form of energy that projected in our minds the testimony left for us by the beings from the outer space. My friend had also the same experience, and he was never the same from that day on. We realized that, of the eight members who made up our group, just me and Dmitriev had experienced that kind of hallucination. The phenomenon did not repeat when we or somebody else entered the stone fence. We were never able to determine what was the technology that had caused it. Whatever it was, it performed its job and turned itself off. In spite of our perceptions, we stood inside the area subject to the force field for no longer than a few seconds.
This is, briefly, what happened. Of course I’m omitting all the details that we could learn later from the engravings that adorned the walls of that time-capsule.
Now, let’s come back to our subject. I can only hazard a hypothesis about how things went, because as I already told you we could not find the alien ship described by the paleontologist. However, the creature that I had the opportunity to study for all this time is all too similar to the engineered creatures that I’ve seen thanks to the technology of the creators. My idea is that the plummeting alien ship penetrated deep into the ice, triggering a small earthquake in the area and reaching, perhaps, the rocky substrate. This disruption may have attracted to the surface one or more of those monstrous beings which adapted to survive in the bowels of the continent, harboring an ancestral hatred and developing a kind of xenophobia towards all beings from outer space… or at least from the surface. Millions of years had passed since their creation, and although isolated in the bowels of a desert continent, they might have undergone further evolution, sharpening their ability to take any shape or, as in our case, to replicate that of another living things. The evidence I have seen with my own eyes forces me to think that they have developed a form of intelligence and a deep awareness, far superior to those of humans.
When you have the time, if you like it, read something by Lovecraft. That man has somehow managed to access diaries of old expeditions, or who knows… maybe he came in contact with something like that stone fence we found, and his mind reached ancient truths. The fact is that, in one of his stories, he described something very similar to what we have perceived and somehow lived in our skin.
Those immense cities, their incomprehensible technology, millions of years of world history, the answers to many of our questions… Everything is still there, hidden in the darkness of the eternal ice, waiting for someone to bring them back to light again.
Now let’s go on with our visitor. Our solvent is ready.”
Totally enraptured by the words of Ivanov, Moore has almost forgotten where they are and what they’re doing. The woman shakes her head, as if to recover from a period of absence.
“It’s an interesting story Dr. Ivanov…”
“It’s much more than that, Doctor. It’s the plain truth, believe me. Although I myself, even tough I lived it personally, struggle to believe it sometimes. I wish I had doubts… I could take refuge in the belief that it was a hallucination caused by hypothermia. But the sculptures in the room were there to confirm that everything was real. Anyway, please consider this an extremely confidential and dangerous information. In the world there are some who are well aware of these truths, and they will always make sure that these secrets remain such. At any cost. But let’s go on. Please tell me, have you identified the compound that I’ve just made?”
Recovering, the woman adjusts her glasses, back to focus on the instruments before them. “I’ve seen that you used concentrated hydrochloric acid, and fuming nitric acid, in a ratio of three to one”, she says. It’s what ancient alchemists called Aqua Regia, a powerful corrosive that can dissolve even gold, which is notoriously resistant to common acids. You also used a salt, the ammonium chloride, which is composed of the same elements of the solvent, probably to absorb the aqueous fraction in excess and make the solution even sharper.”
“Ten out of ten doctor. Now, please, give me the test tube with the boy’s blood, stay back and watch carefully.”
The woman takes the vial, surprised by the slight trembling of her hand, and delivers it to Ivanov. She feels anxious for the story she just heard, and for the man as well, who is looking haunted again.
The Russian turns a knob at the bottom of the Bunsen burner, setting the flame to the maximum. The gas burning produces a roaring noise, like a miniature jet, and the light emitted by the flame creates grotesque shadows on Ivanov’s face, giving him an even more disturbing and bizarre appearance.
The scientist pours half of the corrosive solution in a tall glass beaker, then removes the cap of the vial with the blood of Ahmed and without even pouring the content, he puts the vial in the acid solution. “Be careful now”, says the Russian in a low voice while holding the Bunsen burner.
He pushes down the tube with a tiny glass rod, to make it sink in the acid, leaving a red trail. For a while nothing happens, and the woman is just starting to think that the scientist has really got a screw loose when the tube has a start. Attacked by the acid, the blood begins to sizzle and throws itself outside the vial, thereby forming a roughly spherical lump. The woman looks in amazement as the mass of blood takes a spiral shape, squirms like a worm, and moves in the acid toward the glass container wall , then it rises to the surface, emerges and crawls over the edge. At the top, the tiny creature that vaguely resembles a leech, shrinks, again taking a spherical shape that slides down on the outside of the glass to reach the table. The tiny dark clump grows, swelling up to take on a rounded shape, about the size of a walnut. The acid on its surface keeps sizzling for a while, letting out a stream of reddish and acrid smoke.
Nothing more seems to happen, and Moore turns a quizzical look to Ivanov, who doesn’t take his eyes away from the tiny lump, which has now taken a dry appearance.
“Don’t get distracted”, whispers the man. “It sacrificed a part of its own flesh to create an outer shell capable to stop the acid. It’s something that I saw it doing dozens of times. Look carefully no w.”
After a half minute during which nothing happens, suddenly the little dark walnut has a start. With a sharp crackling, an irregular line appears on the surface, which slowly ex pands into a crack, while slender antennas as thin as hair emerge, moving slowly in the air and probing the white surface of the table. After a few moments they retract inside, then a trickle of reddish flesh leaks out, slipping on the shelf and collecting in an amorphous roughly spheroidal mass.